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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25382137">Wake Up</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCrimsonStoryteller/pseuds/TheCrimsonStoryteller'>TheCrimsonStoryteller</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>How To Fix A Family [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Sanders Sides (Web Series)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aftermath of Torture, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Guilt, Hopeful Ending, Nightmares, Psychological Torture, Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Sympathetic Dark Sides (Sanders Sides), Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, Unsympathetic Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Unsympathetic Morality | Patton Sanders, is this the end?, nope - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 11:20:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,012</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25382137</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCrimsonStoryteller/pseuds/TheCrimsonStoryteller</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Janus wished he had gotten curious sooner.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Anxiety | Virgil Sanders &amp; Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders &amp; Deceit | Janus Sanders, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders &amp; Logic | Logan Sanders</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>How To Fix A Family [7]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1814065</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>190</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Wake Up</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>It was a beautiful day. The wind was blowing through his hair and the sun was shining brightly. He was standing on a hill under a tree. It didn't feel like a dream. He could feel the grass beneath his feet and the smell of flowers.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He could see a few people down the hill, though he couldn't quite make out their features because of the sun shining in his eyes. He could make oit three people sitting down there. One of them started waving his way, causing a weird surge of warmth feel him as he waved back.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He started running down the hill, making his way to the group when he someone tugged at his hoodie, causing him to fall to the ground with a yelp.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"Now now, you aren't going to leave us by ourselves, right?" He felt a voice whisper into his ear as a hand tugged at his arm, holding him back from escaping. "You know you can't. They're bad. They hate you. And you have nowhere to go but here! Plus, you still owe me your life."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Another voice started speaking. "You're good now, aren't you? You can't go back to them. They'll corrupt you!" A pair of arms wrapped around his shoulders, making him lean into the touch. "That's nice, right? You have to be a good boy if you want more. And good boys don't interact with the Darks. Repeat after me now, wouldn't you? Good boys don't interact with the Darks."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"...Good boys don't interact with the Dark."</em>
</p><hr/><p>It had been a few weeks since Logan had moved to their side when Janus finally got curious of where the anxious Side was. He had expected by then the emo would've come banging on their door, demanding to see the logical Side. But for the whole weeks there hadn't been a single noise coming from the Light Sides.</p><p>He wished he had gotten curious sooner.</p><p>He chose to not mind the empty hallways of the Light Mindscape. He decided to not question the quiet when he knocked on the purple door. He tried not to panic when no one opened the door and entered the dark room.</p><p>"Virgil?" He called hesitantly, scanning the room carefully before spotting him curled up in the corner. The snake Side quickly made his way to the anxious Side, shaking him slightly.</p><p>Virgil opened his eyes, blinking repeatedly. His eyes were unfocused and he didn't respond in anyway, not a groan, not a snap or even a hiss. He just stared blankly. There were tear tracks running down his face and his eyeshadow had gotten smeared.</p><p>Janus set a hand on his face, wiping the eyeshadow. He expected some sort of reaction. Either the anxious Side to lean into the touch like before or snap at him and move away. But the Side in question kept on staring at him.</p><p>The lying Side could feel tears prickling at the corner of his human eye as he wrapped his arms around Virgil, letting the unmoving Side slump against him as he ran his hand through his soft hair and the other rubbed circles on his back, desperate to get a reaction to no avail.</p><p>For a while, it was just the two of them, Janus holding onto the other, sobbing while Virgil was quiet.</p><hr/><p>When Janus imagined Virgil coming back, he imagined him walking there and throwing himself onto the couch, laughing and chatting with Remus and acting like he had never left. Not like what had really happened. Not like an empty husk, only getting up and moving to eat and go to the bathroom and staring at nothing the rest of the time.</p><p>Logan was trying to keep his head, but some nights the lying Side found him in the kitchen, holding his head in his hands and muttering about how it was his fault, how he had left him with the other two and thought it'd be alright, or some nights he'd find the logical Side sitting in front of Virgil, reading a book aloud for him.</p><p>"I shouldn't have left. I could stop them.:</p><p>"Unfortunately, I have to admit that you've won our bet. I still can't believe the death in that book made me actually cry."</p><p>Then there was Remus, holding one-sided conversations with the anxious Side, making promises about future adventures in the Imagination they were going to have, about all the chaos they were going to cause. Sometimes he'd beg, asking him to stop acting like that and get better.</p><p>"If you talk to me, I'm going to bring you to ride invisible pegasi with me! It's like your floating and flying! Or we can ride the zombie unicorns. They're not as fun and might try to impale and bite you, but they're cool too!"</p><p>"I have an idea! When you feel like it, we're going to fill the toothpastes with mustard!"</p><p>"Please get better. You look like a zombie like this. I miss you. Baron Barfington misses you. Janus misses you too. Did you know he kept your old hoodie? We love you Virgey. Snap out of it. Please wake up."</p><p>
  <em>Please wake up.</em>
</p><hr/><p>That night, when Janus made his way around the Dark Mindscape, checking up on everyone one by one, he noticed the younger Side kicking and clawing at himself, leaving marks on his skin.</p><p>With a sigh, he grabbed Virgil's wrists, restraining him from accidentally hurting himself more. He shut his eyes, trying to ignore the tears and whimpers as the struggling slowly stopped. A few seconds of quiet passed when the scaled Side reopened his eyes, staring straight into the anxious Side's tearful eyes.</p><p>"I'm sorry." He started whispering repeatedly when Janus started to wipe his tears, leaning into his touch and curling up onto himself.</p><p>He sat on the couch next to the curled up Side, pulling him into a hug, rubbing his back. "Shhh. It's alright, you don't have to apologise. You'll be alright. They can't hurt you anymore."</p><p>Things were slowly starting to look up.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Is it normal to buy a kindle paperwhite to read normal books on, but instead download 300 fanfics you want to read instead of bookmarking them to read later on your phone like a normal person?</p><p>All kinds of comments are appreciated. Short comments, Long comments, Very short comments, extra gigantic comments, Extra hearts, unreadable comments, EVERYTHING!</p><p>Come yell at me on Discord I'm bored: crimsonstoryteller #8794</p></blockquote></div></div>
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